Massachusetts

Massachusetts earns an F for its civil forfeiture laws

State Forfeiture Laws

Along with North Dakota, the only other state to earn an F for its law grade, Massachusetts has the worst civil forfeiture laws in the country. Massachusetts law enforcement agents just need probable cause—the lowest possible standard of proof—to believe that property was involved in a crime in order to forfeit it. State law also places the burden on innocent owners to demonstrate their innocence or ignorance of any criminal activity associated with their seized property in order to recover it. Finally, Bay State law enforcement agencies get to keep up to 100 percent of forfeiture proceeds, giving them considerable incentive to seize property.

Forfeiture reporting requirements in Massachusetts are also very poor. Law enforcement agencies are only required to keep an inventory of property seized for controlled substances violations; they are not required to produce comprehensive annual forfeiture reports. By filing a Massachusetts Public Records Law request, the Institute for Justice received accounting records that allowed statewide forfeiture proceeds to be estimated. This onerous process and the lack of any detailed information about individual forfeiture cases or even agency-level forfeiture proceeds make it impossible for the average citizen or lawmaker to hold state and local law enforcement agencies accountable for their forfeiture activity. According to IJ’s calculations, Massachusetts law enforcement forfeited almost $139 million between 2000 and 2014, an average of about $9.3 million each fiscal year.

State Law Sources

Standard of proof	Probable cause. Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 94C, § 47(d); Commonwealth v. One 2004 Audi Sedan, 921 N.E.2d 85, 88–89 (Mass. 2010).
Innocent owner burden	Owner. Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 94C, § 47(d).
Profit incentive	Up to 100 percent. Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 94C, § 47(d).
Reporting requirements	Agencies must maintain an inventory of seized property. Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 94C, § 47(e).

Massachusetts ranks 46th for federal forfeiture, with over $63 million in Department of Justice equitable sharing proceeds from 2000 to 2013.

State Forfeiture Data

Year	Estimated Forfeiture Proceeds
2000	$5,614,705
2001	$7,322,901
2002	$7,300,236
2003	$7,592,214
2004	$10,092,662
2005	$8,803,362
2006	$8,399,550
2007	$9,294,064
2008	$11,093,076
2009	$13,178,878
2010	$11,303,308
2011	$10,410,558
2012	$8,843,408
2013	$9,808,804
2014	$9,766,698
Total	$138,824,424
Average per year	$9,254,962

Federal Equitable Sharing

Massachusetts law enforcement’s extensive participation in the Department of Justice’s equitable sharing program—earning the state a ranking of 46^th nationally—compounds the problems with the state’s forfeiture laws. Law enforcement agencies received $63.5 million in equitable sharing proceeds between 2000 and 2013, or $4.5 million per calendar year. Only 7 percent of those proceeds came from adoptive forfeitures, while the rest came from joint task forces and investigations, equitable sharing procedures left largely intact by the DOJ’s 2015 policy change intended to limit equitable sharing. This means that use of equitable sharing in Massachusetts is likely to continue on much the same scale. Finally, Massachusetts agencies also received more than $13 million in Treasury Department forfeiture proceeds from 2000 to 2013, averaging nearly $1 million per fiscal year.

Year	DOJ (calendar years)	Treasury (fiscal years)
2000	$3,194,714	$512,000
2001	$1,425,567	$603,000
2002	$2,073,417	$234,000
2003	$2,424,388	$850,000
2004	$4,514,645	$1,223,000
2005	$4,099,432	$663,000
2006	$3,719,291	$241,000
2007	$4,589,227	$814,000
2008	$3,790,929	$1,166,000
2009	$2,423,516	$832,000
2010	$4,102,981	$3,059,000
2011	$16,334,522	$981,000
2012	$6,042,698	$882,000
2013	$4,780,083	$1,193,000
Total	$63,515,410	$13,253,000
Average Per Year	$4,536,815	$946,643